


Palooka

by Alexa C (marylex)



Series: Three Kings [3]
Category: Oz (HBO)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-01-02
Updated: 2007-01-02
Packaged: 2017-10-06 18:43:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56677
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marylex/pseuds/Alexa%20C
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. Sean picks up the pieces - again.</p><p>Written for the Oz Gift of the Magi Challenge, 2006.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Palooka

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gin200168](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gin200168/gifts).



You haven't been home long when Tim shows up on your doorstep, a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon in hand, like 25 years have never gone by.

You drank PBR for years, long after Tim picked up his Natty Bo habit in college - you figured if it was good enough for high school, good enough for your dad and the other Joes up at the prison, it was good enough to meet your simple need for a cold brew at the end of the day. But even you switched over to Budweiser when Pabst went to shit in the 1980s. It figures Tim would pick it back up again when it's getting trendy, with its working-man mystique. Or maybe it's supposed to bring back memories of summer Saturday nights out at Darien Lakes, beers around a bonfire and camping at the state park as an excuse for staying out all night after an evening spent hanging out in the back-forty of Fun County's parking lot.

"State doesn't pay you enough for bottled beer?" you ask as he brandishes the case of cans like some kind of toll into your door.

"I figure, why waste good beer on a guy who won't appreciate it?" Tim says, and you push away from the doorjamb propping you up and heft the beer inside.

"Hey," you say. "I appreciate good beer. Just because I don't think I need a fancy label and three extra dollars a bottle to _get_ good beer ..."

When you turn around, he's standing in the middle of your foyer, looking like he's just gone ten rounds.

"Hey," you say again. "Hey, hey, hey. Come on. Sit down." You grab his suit jacket by the collar with your free hand so he can shrug out of it and toss it over one of the mismatched oak chairs of the dining room set, nudging him toward the sofa with your shoulder. "Is out of the can good enough for you, or would you like a glass, your highness?"

"You have beer glasses?" he asks, the tone suggesting you drink out of old jelly jars, and you peer at him over the top of the open fridge door as you shove the case of beer inside.

"Hey, I have _juice_ glasses," you tell him.

"You have fucking _juice_ glass ... oh, fuck you," he says as you start laughing at him.

"Here." You hand him a can and drop into the recliner at the end of the sofa where he's slumped, shirt sleeves finally unbuttoned and pushed up. He looks better like that, more casual, just like the jeans and T-shirts and sweaters he's adopted in recent years are a better fit for him than the ties and sweater vests he used to wear.

The two of you pop your tops together and raise them in salute.

"To Leo," you say.

"To Leo," he repeats. He coughs and swallows hard and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand on his first pull. "Jesus, how did we ever drink this crap?"

"We were young and stupid." You take a long drink from your own can.

"And now we're what? Old and stupid?"

"Young enough to throw a right hook when we need to," you say, remembering the way Johnson staggered back into you when Tim connected in the interview room at the prison that afternoon. "Not a bad shot, Tim. Not the best form I've ever seen, but not ... quite ... the worst. I mean, I think Annie fell over the first time she tried shadowboxing with me."

"Oh, I'm worse than your sister," Tim says, nodding and gesturing with his beer can. "Thanks a lot."

"Well, Annie's a tough girl ... even if she was 8 at the time." You laugh when Tim gives you the finger, before breaking off suddenly. "He'll get the death penalty," you say. "You can't just kill a prison warden and get away with it."

"Yeah," Tim says. "Jesus." He sets down his empty can on the coffee table with a clatter, leaning forward and rubbing his hands over his face in a motion that reminds you of chemistry tests and late-night B-movie marathons and a hospital corridor right before his grandmother died when you were 13. You'd only known each other a year and a half, but you were the one who held him in the tiny chapel where he hid and cried after the doctors pronounced her, and you can remember his sharp shoulder blades under your palms, jerking like stunted wings.

"Hey," you say, again, and stop, leaning forward in the chair to put a hand on his back, between those still-sharp shoulder blades - on the spot Annie told you about, the spot she uses on her kids at home and her kids at school, safe, non-threatening, calming, designed by nature for the touch of a comforting hand, from a mother to a teacher to a friend. You always thought your jobs weren't so different, her with her kindergartners and you with the dinks at the prison - the ones who work there and the ones who live there - acting about the same age and with some of the same habits, dealt with by the same kind of firm hand and the ability to keep your patience and your sanity while saying "no" as many times as necessary.

You can feel the rise and fall of Tim's breath under your hand, and you move your thumb back and forth slightly, stroking over the starched-stiff fabric of his dress shirt.

"Leo trusted him," he says finally, shoving himself up from the couch and out from under your touch. He goes into the kitchen for another PBR before wandering back and over to the sliding glass door that leads onto the deck. He takes a long pull off his beer, grimacing, and stands there, looking out past the new grill and the patio furniture you've been dragging around since Southport, into nothingness.

"It's not the first time he trusted someone he shouldn't have," you say, and Tim refocuses, meets your eyes in the glass that's gone reflective against the darkness outside. He shakes his head and raises his can halfway to his lips, changes his mind, wanders back toward the sofa. His free hand presses your shoulder, lingers there, as he reaches your side. If you tilted just a bit, you could rest your head against the soft, thin skin on the inside of his forearm.

"I know who I can trust," he says. "Here." He hands you the beer before retrieving another for himself.

He tells you about Eleanor's recommendation that he be made warden and you choke, thinking about how the governor must have reacted to _that_.

"Would you take it?"

"I don't want it," he says, studying the top of his beer can. "I don't know that I'd be any good at it. Look at Em City."

"Your problem," you say, leaning forward, "is that you're an idea man, but you're no strategist. You figure out an answer and you want it done now. You got no patience to get from the idea to the outcome. You don't know how to wait, to plan your move."

"Oh, we're back to this," Tim says, waving a hand at you.

"You'd have a lot better chance of surviving Oz if you'd done a little bit of fighting," you tell him, leaning back again.

Nobody ever taught you anything in those professional development classes on prisoner management that you hadn't learned already - and better - in the ring. Keep your eyes on your opponent, keep your guard up, keep moving and give as much as you take. When you get hit - and you will get hit - don't get mad. Get smart: Step back and figure out where you fucked up and left yourself open so you can fix it.

Working in Oz is a series of jab catches, and when you stagger out punch drunk at the end of the day from your own glove bouncing off your forehead one too many times, you just gotta remember it was deflecting someone else's harder hit and be thankful you're still standing. But Tim's never learned how to keep his composure and regroup when he's hit, least of all with the kind of sucker punch Em City can deliver. You remember him flailing under the series of blows those first couple of years after he brought you in, the sexual harassment charges, the shootout, losing his job - lost guard, lost footing, lost balance - and you remember the way he struck out in response, wild blows that hit everyone around him, including you, even as you worked to hold things together in his absence.

"You're a frustrated idealist," you say, pointing at him, "emphasis on the _frustrated._"

"You sound like Ellie," he says, and you snort. Eleanor's problem was that she wanted Tim to stop being who he was. Even if you never met her until this year, you know _that_ from a single night out at the bars in Attica some six, seven years ago now, providing a shoulder and a sympathetic ear and a place to hide out right before he moved to Oswald, right after he moved out of his short-lived marriage. You listened to his dreams and his theories once again, and once again, you shook your head and ordered another round. You took him home later and poured him into bed, in the room you still couldn't help thinking of as your parents' guest room, even though your mother had been gone for three years and you weren't sure how much longer it would be before your father followed her, freeing you to leave Attica once again.

You're better together - always were. Tim's the catalyst, the spark, but you're the one who knows how to get things done. You can't tell him that he shouldn't want to save the world - and why would you want to do that, anyway? All you can really do with Tim is try to help him be better at what he's doing and pick up the pieces behind him. You find that, most of the time, you're the one picking up the pieces, and you figure that makes you a better judge of him than most. So you know, when you raise your eyes from contemplation of your empty to find him holding out a new PBR, eyes dropping so he won't meet your gaze, that there's no time for hesitation, no time to block or parry or slip past what's been looming in front of the two of you.

"We're not gonna do this like that," you say, taking the can and putting it on the coffee table as you stand to face him.

You'll do it or you'll not do it, you'll piece things into a new picture and move forward or you'll put things back together the way they were and go on from there, but you're not going to keep going the way this started. You slide your fingers around one of his wrists, over the faint bruises, the marks where you held him too tight the last time, marks covered earlier by the cuffs of his starched blue shirt and dark suit jacket. You know when you must have put those bruises on him, remember the way he jerked against your grip and wrapped one long leg around your hip and moaned into you as you pressed him against the front door in the foyer. You don't remember all of that night, both of you piss-drunk and still reeling, stumbling out of the cab at the walkway to your small rental as false dawn silvered the sky and a newspaper with the headline relating Leo Glynn's death already lay tossed on the porch, but you remember enough. You remember the way he licked into your mouth where the taste of his skin and his cock and his come lingered, mixed with Jim Beam. You have your own hidden bruises to mark his desperate grip on you as you tried to hold him together. The two of you hadn't even made it to the bedroom. All it took was 25 years, a bottle of whiskey and the death of your mutual boss.

When you wrap your fingers around his wrist this time, you can feel the flutter of his pulse against your fingertips, feel it speed up as you step toward him, into him. You've never been an in-fighter, you're no Joe Frazer; Ali was your man, slow-rhythm outside, circling on the edges, staying out of the strike zone and only closing to unleash an attack - float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. But Tim's always been close, too close, and the only defense that's worked is to get even closer, admit your guilt, offer your resignation, tender your heart, step inside his chest where he's got no defense, where you're too close for a hit to land, for all his wild flailing.

"OK," he says, willing - once again - to be convinced by you. "OK."

"OK?"

"Yeah," he says. "I think ... I think we should do this, you know? I think this is ..."

You shut him up with a kiss, because he thinks too damn much already, gets everything all jammed up in his head with theory. Some things you can't dance around.

The taste of the beer is sharp and sour between you, but his mouth opens easily when you slick your tongue across his lower lip, and he brings up one hand to cup your jaw, thumb pressing against your cheek and catching on your 5 o'clock shadow, tilting your head to give himself a better angle of attack. The hair of his goatee scratches against your face, and you groan into his mouth when he falls back to sit on the arm of the sofa, pulling you after him, slipping one leg between yours and pressing his thigh into your crotch, insistent pressure as you lean into him, feeling his shoulder dig in under your arm.

"Can we do this in bed this time?" you ask against his lips. "I'm getting kind of old. I'm not sure my knees can take it again."

He already had his tie undone when he showed up at your front door, and you've got his shirt unbuttoned by the time the two of you make it halfway down the short hallway to your bedroom, pushing it off his shoulders and sliding your hands up under the T-shirt he's wearing underneath, running your fingertips and the heels of your hands over the softness of his stomach before cupping his sides, pressing your palms against his hipbones and sliding your fingers down into the waistband of his pants. He lets go of you long enough to shake his arms out of the sleeves of his dress shirt, leaving it a discarded pile in the middle of the hallway, and starts to work on your shirt, shoving it up and over your head. You raise your arms to help him before pinning him against the wall inside your bedroom door with your broader bulk.

"Slow," you say against his mouth, your hands trapped between you. "Slow this time," and when he releases a shuddering breath, you can feel it all along the length of your body, chest to hips to thighs, where you're pressed together. His hands snake around you, and you can't stop a shiver as you feel his fingers on the small of your back, gliding over the sensitive skin there.

You both manage to get your pants kicked off before you roll him underneath you on your rumpled bed, twining your fingers in his, holding his hands down on the mattress as you work your way down his body, licking the fading mark of your own mouth on his collarbone, biting gently at a nipple, feathering kisses over the scar left where White's shank laid him open, laid him in a hospital bed, and left you putting on that goddamm uniform one more day and walking into that prison to hold things together until he found his way back. You have to let go of his hands when you reach his cock, wrapping your fingers around the base as you take him into your mouth in one swift motion, opening your jaw and your throat wide as you slide your other hand along his thigh and push it up. He makes a sound like he's been shanked again, high and tight, ripped right out of him, and he arches frantically, pushing himself further into your mouth, hard and thick, the tip nudging against the back of your throat and making your eyes water. You swallow convulsively - drawing another harsh sound out of his chest - and pull back to run your tongue around the head.

He keeps up a litany of blasphemy and your name as you replace your tongue with your thumb, smearing around the sticky pre-cum while you raise up on your knees and scrabble blindly at the drawer to the bedside night stand with your other hand, searching inside by touch, keeping your eyes on his face. He turns his head to meet your gaze as you pull out the bottle of slick, twisting the cap open with your teeth.

"Take this," you say, pushing the bottle at him, reluctant to take your hands from him entirely, and he looks at it, looks back at you before grabbing for it, squeezing the slippery liquid over your fingers as you hold out your right hand, and he sets it down carefully on the night stand before he reaches down to curve his hand around the nape of your neck, running his fingers through the short hair there, the place where it curls if you let it get the least bit of length to it.

"Gonna open you up, Tim," you tell him, and you're trying for a casual tone, but you don't think you've quite hit it, not with the way your voice has dropped. "Gonna open you up wide, get right up in there ..." _and stay forever_, you think.

"Fucking _do it_ already," he tells you, and you shift your weight, bracing yourself up on your left hand by his waist so you can watch him while you trace your fingers down along the crease of his thigh, along the crack of his ass, tease and stroke around his hole before pushing carefully inside. He's hot in there, and tight, and you watch him move on your fingers, hips twisting sharp down onto your hand, back arched and thighs spreading wider, fingers clutching at the sheets and heels digging into the mattress. He's got his head thrown back, eyes closed, and the flush that's putting some healthy color into his face is spreading down across his chest as he makes noises that ought to be against the law, noises that remind you of the first boy you ever got your tongue into when you were 23 years old and finally brave enough to drive over to the bars in Buffalo on a summer Saturday night. He was smooth-skinned and dirty blond and lanky, just 19 years old, and you closed your eyes and rested your forehead between his shoulder blades and bit your bottom lip to bleeding to stop the tears as you moved up and pushed your cock into him.

You've spent years keeping an eye on Tim, and you know his body language better than anyone, so you know when to pull your fingers out, when to pull your body away from his just before he comes, and he throws out a hand, reaching for you with a greedy sound of displeasure that makes you laugh even as something in your chest turns over at hearing him make that sound over _you_.

"Not yet," you say. "Patience."

"Are you _kidding_ me with this?" he asks, pushing himself up on his elbows, a little wild-eyed, and you have to laugh again.

"Good things come to those who wait," you tell him as you swing a leg over to straddle his hips and reach to rummage in the night stand again. "Hold still," you tell him as you rip it open with your teeth, the fingers of your right hand too slippery to find purchase on the package. "Hold still or it'll all be over too soon."

"Oh, you _bastard_," he grits out as you roll the rubber down over him, and you can feel the tension shivering through him as he fights to keep from thrusting into your hand when you smooth it down. "Oh _Christ_," he adds as you reach for the bottle on top of the night stand again, holding it up and raising an eyebrow at him.

"Not too much," you say as he slicks up his own fingers, and you grab his wrist, pressing his palm around your hip, pushing his hand down your thigh to wipe off some of the stuff on your own skin.

"I'm not ... going to hurt you?" he asks, characteristic furrow forming between his brows as he mulls over the possible outcomes of your request, fingers lightly stroking your thigh, ruffling the hair there, and you shift because it tickles. You can't tell him "No," exactly, because you can't lie to him, but it won't be much and it's what you want. It's one of the reasons you tried to tell yourself, for a while, that the girls never worked out, all soft hands and soft touches to go with their soft curves.

"It's fine," you settle for, and you press your palm over the back of his hand on your leg, holding his gaze with your own.

He nods, carefully, and smoothes his hand back up and over your hip, urging you onto your hands and knees over him, and now he arches an eyebrow, the only warning you get before two fingers suddenly breach you. You hiss in a breath at the burn and the scrape, instinctively dropping your chin and curling in on yourself, fingers of your right hand digging into his shoulder beneath you.

"Sean," he says, querulous, and you shake your head.

"Don't," you say, fighting your body into submission. "Just ... hold still a minute."

"Sean ..." and he's shifting now, getting ready to pull his hand away, so you squeeze his shoulder again and take a deep breath, raising your head to meet his eyes and trying to smile.

"Just ... going to come too soon," you tell him shakily. "OK, now."

"Oh," he says. "_Oh_, OK," and his fingers move inside you again, pulling out a low groan from deep in your chest. He's fascinated by your reactions, and even when your eyes drift shut as you push your hips back, trying to get his fingers in deeper, you keep your head raised, feeling the fingers of his left hand tracing lightly over your eyelids, your cheekbones. You flick out a tongue and catch two fingertips as he runs them across your lips, and you can hear his breath catch as you close your mouth around them, scraping along his fingers with your teeth and sucking lightly. You finally have to stop him because you think he could do this all night and he's got three fingers in your ass by this time but you need more, thicker, deeper.

You're a little slicker, a little wider open than you usually take time for, and his cock glides all the way into you in one long motion as you move back onto him, pulling mutual strangled sounds out of you both as you arch up, hands on his chest to hold yourself steady, muscles pulled taut. You clench involuntarily around him and he curses, grabbing at your hips with hard fingers.

"Move," you tell him, pushing your hips down, trying to get him even deeper. "Dammit, Tim, _come on_."

You only ever won by a KO once in your life. You're not showy or ostentatious, only bloodily tenacious, and you've always scored your points by staying on your feet and racking up the hits. You remember a coach in your early 20s, before you left Attica the first time, saying you were the only fighter he'd ever had who really could win a round on jabs alone, one-two-one, left-right-left. Solid dependable Sean, and no one ever expected it, least of all from you: Coming in high then dropping low - left jab to the chin and three quick uppercuts to the body - before bobbing back up, just as your opponent dropped his hands to protect his belly, for one crisp, clean left hook, and that was all she wrote.

You can remember how it felt, the sweet flow and flurry of that combination, weight shifting perfectly, everything falling into place, remember it as you twist your hips and rock back onto him and his hips lift, pushing into you, and you finally find a rhythm, your hand on your cock, his hand over yours, and it's not going to take long, you can feel it building in the back of your skull and the base of your spine and the bottom of your belly.

"Fuck. _Fuck_," is all you can manage as it hits you, and you come all over his stomach, your fingers sticky on his as you pull his hand away from your sensitized cock and collapse forward, into his chest, pressing your face into his neck.

"Come on," you coax him, "Come on, Tim, come on," and you push back onto him, feeling his hips snap up into you, and you raise your head and kiss him again, swallowing the sound he makes as he comes.


End file.
